Young Indigenous team departs, emulating 1868

Young Indigenous team departs, emulating 1868

Australia’s best young Indigenous cricketers will tomorrow follow in the footsteps of Australia’s first-ever touring sporting team, the 1868 Aboriginal cricket team, when they embark on an historic four-week tour of England.

The National Indigenous Development Squad is scheduled to play 11 matches through the tour and will be captained by South Australian Redbacks all-rounder Dan Christian.

The side is primarily under 23 years of age (exceptions being leadership group of Christian and Vice-Captain Peter O’Callaghan who are 26 and 24 respectively) with Queenslander Trent Clemments the baby of the team at just 16.

The final day of the team’s training camp at the Cricket Australia Centre of Excellence saw final preparations and final training sessions conducted. Matthew Hayden dropped by to talk to the team as well as conducting some specialist training sessions.

“I saw a lot of these guys playing at the Imparja Cup during February, and it’s been a big build up from the naming of the team then through to this point now where they’re about get on the plane,” Hayden said.

“You can sense a lot of nervous excitement around, for a lot of the guys the furthest they’ve ever travelled is to Alice Springs for the Imparja Cup, so it’s a huge event in these guy’s lives.”

Indigenous media crew Carbon Media will follow the team through England and produce a fly-on-the-wall documentary account of the historic tour. Last week squad members Cameron Trask and Worrin Williams travelled to Western Victoria with Carbon Media where they visited the small-town of Harrow, the spiritual home of the 1868 pioneers and their champion player Johnny Mullagh, to learn more about those that came before them.

The tour can be followed through news stories and match reports on www.cricket.com.au and scorecards can be found at MyCricket through the following link: http://mycricket.cricket.com.au/go.aspx?id=DRAW&entityid=15545&gradeid=3630

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